Originally Posted by Souvenir

Sure.

Originally Posted by iaink

I noticed the CBC rating for the the Olympics are woeful, and losing in the mens hockey is not going to help.

My view is that the coverage sucks and they are getting what they deserve.

Too much fluff, not enough action. I dont want to watch commentators talking to camera and analysing the hockey over and over. For many sports this should be their time in the sun every 4 years, maybe it would be nice if they actually got more than cursory coverage in among the hockey and other "medal prospects"

Even the NBC coverage is better, and they seem to focus almost exclusively on how the Americans got on (as is to be expected of US coverage of world events)

Makes me pine for the BBC, but thats probably rose tinted memories. I guess GB doesn't have a lot of medal prospects, so they take a broader view of the games as a whole, but as I remember it they at least spent more time showing the sports than over analysing one or two of them, or showing fluff pieces on the athletes mum back home or video postcards of the locations.

There is also a big double standard going on, how come professional hockey players can represent there countries, but professional figure skaters cant. The IOC should really make their mind up about this and apply it across the board.

Im not sure what the answer is, pro skaters might make it interesting, but on the other hand its clear that to some of the snowboarders for example that this is "just another competition" on the pro circuit, and thats not right in my opinion. Thats the danger of letting in pro athletes to boost ratings, if its not the pinnacle of that sport, then I think it just dilutes the "Olympic spirit" down, and the thing that makes it worth watching for me is the drama of the athletes knowing that 4 years is a long time to wait for another shot at the top.

Anyway, rant over